Revisiting an image from a Sunday afternoon at Willie Nelson's ranch. Reading in the national news about a friend performing with Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones....

 

Selena R. 

It's an odd end to the week. I got a request to bid on a video project for a pharmaceutical company. Came in via email about 10 minutes after I said to myself, "I wish I had a fun video project to do so I could get some use out of that new GH6...". I'll bid on the adventure and see where it goes. I did a good photo project for the same company last year and they seem to have come back around to us based on the success of that campaign.

The bidding process for video is so arcane. Mostly because you can never tell how long the edit will take. People love to make endless changes to video timelines. And endless tweaks to the motion graphics. Shooting the footage is actually the easy part.

No guarantee that I'll get the project but I decided to pull out the two gimbals we use most for stabilization and make sure the rechargeable batteries are still good. They should be okay since we put them on their chargers every three or four months.

Not sure I want to get pulled back into all the minutia of a project that requires models/talent/actors but I'm hoping that's what a good producer is for. I have one in mind. Ran into her at a recent event. She's still working on film and video productions here in Austin. It's always nice to hand off stuff like casting...

Another odd thing this week. Do you remember the video I did of Chanel as Billie Holiday at Zach Theatre? https://visualsciencelab.blogspot.com/search?q=chanel+video

Here is Chanel performing for the fundraiser video we created content back in the Summer of 2020. It's her Tina Turner character: https://vimeo.com/462396471  (Shot with a G9 on a gimbal, incidentally...). 

Anyway, back in the fog of Covid I heard that she auditioned for and won the role of Tina Turner in a live theatrical production in the West End, London. Big time. Amazing show. Famous venue.

I was very pleased for her. 

Then I read this week in the New York Times (or maybe it was the Washington Post....the heat, remember?) a short article saying that just last week, near the end of the run of the show, the management let her go. Apparently she'd been invited to perform with the Rolling Stones, in concert, in Milan, Italy. In order to sing with Mick Jagger she had to miss one performance of the Tina show. Not a tough choice in my book. I'd pick the Rolling Stones every time. 

At any rate it seemed strange to read about all the drama in a national newspaper. Chanel is quite a talented performer. I just didn't know she was that famous. 

**********

I photographed with the new (to me) Leica CL today. It was way too hot to do anything complex or even anything that required much effort. In the end I posted one photo of some chairs. Summer is starting to wear on all of us here in Austin. If I walk through the neighborhood in the evening I can sometimes hear the families in their homes praying together that the power not go out and that the air conditioning continue to work. 

I hope their prayers are heard. Coolness is good. 

No Competition for Chairs in the Sun. Not Today.

 

Walking over to the Cookbook Cafe to have coffee with my video producer friend, James. Saw the chairs. Decided to see if the new (to me) Leica CL works. It does.

James and I have decided that firing bad clients is the most fun thing to do this Summer. We're only keeping the ones that: we like. who have a sense of humor. who pay their bills on time. and the ones who hire us because they actually like our work.

I'm amazed there are still more clients in Austin right now than there are good photographers to service them. 

Also can't believe that I typed that part out loud.

Time once again to raise those rates. Not just talking to myself...

New Arrival. Small System Back-up Camera.

 

This is the second Leica CL camera that I have purchased from the Leica Store Miami. The cameras they've sent me so far exceeded my expectations for condition on each transaction.  Both cameras came impeccably packaged. I've blacked out the bar codes and addresses on the outer to preserve what little privacy I have left on the web. Disclaimer: I pay full price for the cameras and have no affiliation (other than admiration for their business model) with the store. 

The box was stout and well taped at every spot and juncture. I wish every other vendor could learn to pack as well...

The styrofoam noodles aren't just tossed on top of the box situated inside. In fact, it seems as though LSM has perfected some technique by which the noodles are equally distributed on every side of the internal boxes which is obviously better protection than just tossing a handful of cushioning in at random. I've had delicate stuff shipped to me by other vendors where the product is lodged directly against two sides of a box and it seemed as though the styro-peanuts were casually tossed in on another side as packaging theater of the worst kind.

Just under the top layer of styrofoam-noodles there is a black, cloth bag with drawstrings and a white line rendering of the Barnack original Leica camera technical drawing on it. Inside the bag is the printed receipt for the camera and a small assortment of Leica themed postcards. It's a wonderful way to envelope something as banal as a sales bill. 

In the nest of styro-noodles there is a plain, cardboard box which serves to protect the inner product box from abrasion and handling.

Inside the plain cardboard box is the actual Leica product box and it's very big considering how small the actual camera body is. Sorry that this image is a bit dark. It was shot with another camera maker's camera... kidding, just kidding...

The silver outer box opens up to reveal a black box which contains all the pieces associated with the camera. But each group of parts has a "drawer" within the black box to keep everything neat and tidy. 

I pulled the box just above out of the top drawer of the black box/assembly and it contained the actual camera body nestled securely in protective high density foam. Considering all the layers of protection I would be amazed at just how destructive a shipper would have to be to break one of these cameras in transit. I guess you could cause some damage if you were to toss it out of an airplane at 30,000 feet...

And just above the camera is revealed. I looked over every square inch and I have to say that this one appears just as a new one in an previously unopened box might. To add to that feeling the folks at Leica Store Miami wipe the previous user's info out of the camera memory, update the firmware to the most current rev. and deliver a camera that plays the original greeting screen and requires me to set the date, time and zone.

The team in Miami go out of their way to make the purchase of even an older, retired camera model that was never the flagship of the maker, feel very special and very valuable. It's so rare to find this level of attention to both packaging and to describing the camera in our pre-purchase discussion. Wow!

Another nice thing is the e-mailed notices that come at every juncture. Confirmation of shipping. Confirmation of UPS transfers. Confirmation of "out for delivery" along with an accurate estimation of the delivery window. And a delivery confirmation e-mail that came minutes after I accepted the package from the UPS driver. At every step of the way I've been so impressed by their service. Perhaps that's why this was the fifth time I've bought a used Leica camera from these guys in a little more than a year. 

I've put the original strap on, put in a freshly charged battery, put the shipped battery on the charger, formatted an SD card and run through the menus. We're good to go here. And I'm happy. 

Of course no one "needs" a second CL. For that matter, given the state of the industry and the economy, no one needs much more than a good phone to do current photo business. But it's fun and nice and I'll take my small system with me when I want to travel light but still be able to charge people for the work. 

Most photo enthusiasts or pros won't care much about the packaging and services offered by the Leica Store Miami unless they are interested already in Leica cameras and products. Why? Because that's the only kind of camera their store sells. You can't get a Sony there. You can't even get a Panasonic there. But if you want great information about Leica and then great service during a purchase I can't imagine a better photo/retail experience via long distance. Just amazing.

Thanks to David and Josh.

Street photographer in Paris. Last century.

© Kirk Tuck

 

My preferred camera in 1978. The Canonet QL17. Used here in Avignon.

 @1978 Kirk Tuck

Paris with the EOS-1 and the original 85mm f1.1.2 lens.

 

You know that power plant I always seem to love photographing? You can't get this view any more. Why? It's surrounded on three sides by giant, high rise buildings. Layers and layers of them.

 

But at one time (2010) it was out in the  middle of a field and the nearby warehouses were old cinder block buildings with one or two stories and a lot of lonesome space in between. 

Time flies when you turn a city into a Boom-scape.